


a balance

by jeeno2



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Babies, Canon Compliant, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Force Bond (Star Wars), Masturbation, Smut, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2019-02-13
Packaged: 2019-09-15 07:10:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 4,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16928778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeeno2/pseuds/jeeno2
Summary: Darkness rises, and Light to meet it.(or: a Very Reylo Ficlet Collection)





	1. Groan (rated E)

**Author's Note:**

> I've been putting off posting my tumblr ficlets to AO3 for... nearly a near now. Given that the end of tumblr might soon be upon us I figured it was time to finally bite the bullet. 
> 
> Ratings for each ficlet will vary dramatically. Ficlets rated M or E will have the rating indicated in the chapter title.

Ben’s groan is loud and long.

 _“Shhh,”_  Rey whispers in his ear, before tracing its shell with the tip of her tongue. His hands at her back clench and unclench convulsively, and she can feel him swell impossibly larger inside her. She closes her eyes, and buries her face in his neck. “You have to be quiet, Ben; if you do that again, they’ll hear us, and–”

 _And then everyone will know_ , she doesn’t say.

But he must know what she’d been thinking, because he flips her over quicker than she can draw breath, and pounds into her with a ferocity she’s only known from him in dreams.

“Let them hear us,” he growls, a wild animal in her arms, as he fucks her, hard and fast and merciless, right here, in the middle of everything. “I  _want_  them to hear.”

When she falls apart on his cock a moment later, she’s the one who’s screaming.


	2. Staying Warm (rated T)

It takes a bit of blind stumbling around in the dark but eventually, they find the entrance to a cave.

It’s not much. In fact, it’s little more than a small indentation in the rocky cliffs that surround them. But it’ll keep them hidden, at least, and should protect them from the elements for as long as it takes them to come up with a plan.

Once inside, Rey drops to her knees. She rifles around in her knapsack for the small bit of flint that will help them start a fire.

Kylo puts his hand on her shoulder to stop her.

“No,” he says, very quietly. By the dim light of the moon Rey can see him shaking his head. “A fire would create too much light. We don’t want to give the people looking for us any help.”

He’s right, of course. After what they just did – killing Snoke, and stealing a shuttle to get away – there are likely First Order soldiers searching for them in every corner of the galaxy.

A fire on a mostly uninhabited planet could lead their pursuers right to them.

But the temperatures here – wherever  _here_  is – are dropping rapidly. Rey is already shivering and sunrise is still several hours away.

As though reading her unspoken thoughts (and perhaps he is, Rey muses), Kylo removes his long black cloak from his shoulders and drapes it around hers.

“Here,” he says. “This should help.”

The cloak is enormous on her, and made of material far softer than any she’d known existed. And it smells good, too – like leather, and woodsmoke, and  _him_  (though she tries hard not to focus on that latter detail too much).

But most of all, the cloak is warm. That’s all she really cares about right now. And so she burrows under it, rubbing her hands together to warm them.

“Mmm,” she says, closing her eyes. 

She shouldn’t accept this small act of kindness from him. The events of the past several hours can’t erase all the horrific things this man has done to her and to all of the people she loves. 

But it’s just so cold here, and his cloak is so warm.

She decides, for now, that she’ll take it. 

“Thank you,” she says.

“You’re welcome.”

She can’t be certain – the atmosphere is very thick on this planet, and the moon gives off minimal light – but it looks like he might be smiling.

 

* * *

 

 

They sit together in an uneasy silence for a very long time, the only noise Rey can hear coming from the wind rustling through the trees outside their small hiding space.

At length, however, Kylo Ren’s teeth start to chatter. He blows on his hands and rubs them together to warm them, in much the same way she did when they first landed here.

“You’re cold,” Rey says.

He scoffs. “I’m fine.”

She shakes her head. “You’re not. Look – you’re shaking.”

And he is. The strong, steady hands that made such quick work of the guards who tried to kill them are trembling now, from nerves, or from the cold – or quite possibly a combination of both.

He rolls his eyes. “I’m fine,” he says again. “I’ll be fine.”

She rolls her eyes back at him. “Whatever,” she says.

Without another word, Rey crawls to where he sits on the opposite side of the cave.

“What… what are you doing?” he asks, sounding slightly panicked.

“This.”

Rey throws one end of his cloak around his shoulders while keeping the other end of it tucked firmly around hers. His cloak is big, but it’s not exactly a blanket – and so in order for it to cover both of them she has to get very close to him. So close, in fact, that before she’s finished maneuvering it their shoulders and the outsides of their thighs are touching.

“There,” she says, satisfied. “That should help.”

She looks up at him, and –

His dark eyes are soft, grateful, and although Rey can handle many things having to do with Kylo Ren she doesn’t know what to do with the look he’s giving her right now.

“Thank you,” he says, his voice a rough whisper. He puts one shaking hand on top of hers, and gives it a gentle squeeze. His hand is warm, now that he’s under his cloak with her, but the feel of it against her own sends a strange shiver down her spine all the same. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Rey whispers, squeezing his hand in return, and wondering what, exactly, happens next. 


	3. Not Like This

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for a tumblr prompt: "It wasn't supposed to happen like this."

_“It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.”_

Ben sounds frustrated, embarrassed, and he covers his face with both hands, like he’s too ashamed to look her in the eye.

Rey looks up from where they’re lying on his living room floor and takes in their surroundings: the wrecked sofa cushions; the scattered notebooks and papers from when Ben shoved them aside in his haste to tear off their clothes.

She peers down at him and asks, confused: “How was it supposed to happen?”

He sighs, forlorn, and says: “When I imagined us finally doing this I guess I always pictured…I don’t know. Romance? Flowers?” He swallows, and closes his eyes. “Furniture, at least.”

Rey can’t help but smile. 

Ben is so cute. And he has no idea.

Slowly, she rolls over until she’s lying on top of him again. She grabs at the throw they’d used to cover themselves; it must have gotten shoved off to the side at some point.

She presses a gentle kiss to his lips.

“I think it happened perfectly,” she whispers.

Ben cracks one eye open to look at her. And when he sees she means it, he smiles.


	4. mine, only mine (E)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An ABO ficlet written for the prompt: "Mine, only mine." I'd wanted to expand on this at one point but I don't think I'll have time. <3

Ben lifts Rey off her feet and sits her down on the conference table behind them, displacing reams of carefully stacked papers and causing them to scatter to the floor.

They pay them no mind.

Rey wastes no time. She opens her legs for him and he steps between them, pressing eagerly forward into the cradle of her thighs.

“Mine. Only mine,” he growls fiercely, wetly, against the sensitive skin of her throat.

Rey can do nothing but moan, and wind her arms and legs more tightly around him in response.

This is a terrible idea. All of it. The papers that just fell to the floor are the exhibits she needs to use as part of her closing argument. The judge expects both of them out there, making their arguments against each other to the jury, in less than ten minutes.

But this moment was inevitable, Rey realizes now, as he drags the tip of his tongue roughly across her gland. From the moment they entered this courtroom for the first time three weeks ago, separated only by their respective bosses, their clients, and ten feet of wide mahogany table – and she smelled him for the first time, tall and male and commanding and  _Alpha_  – she knew they were always headed for this.

Suddenly, abruptly, he pulls back from her. His dark eyes are wide, wild, and his dress slacks are tented from where the fabric stretches tight against his erection. In his eyes she sees resignation and responsibility at war with his baser, primal instincts.

She wants to cry at the loss of physical contact, at the loss of his heady, incredible scent suffusing every nerve ending in her body.

All the same, she knows he’s right.

They can’t do this right now.

“We… have to go in there,” he says, jerking his thumb in the direction of the courtroom. His voice is husky and tinged with a barely-controlled desperation that she can feel down the marrow of her bones.

She wants to disagree with him. To pull him back to her and shut him up with her tongue. She wants to let him bend her over this conference table and fuck her until he knots. She wants to submit to him in every possible way, the way her traitorous body is demanding she do.

The way he knows he wants her to.

But with a restraint Rey never knew she possessed she doesn’t pull him back to her.

She looks around the room, and takes in the scattered piles of paper.

She spent weeks writing her closing argument. Ben spent at least as long writing his. He’s right, she knows. They can’t do this right now. Though at the moment she hates him more than just a little for being right.

“Right,” she says, hopping down from the table. Somewhere along the way her skirt has inched dangerously up her thighs, and she slides it back down, hyper-conscious of Ben’s smoldering eyes on her as she does it.

Before they leave the conference room he grabs her hand, twining his fingers through hers.

“Find me in my hotel room, after,” he murmurs into her ear, his voice dripping with meaning. He looks calm, cool, and collected as ever. But his eyes plead with her.  “No matter which of us wins today.”

She squeezes his hand, and doesn’t miss the sharp uptick of pheromones he gives off in response. She has to close her eyes to resist them. To resist their pull.

Finding him later is a terrible idea too, she knows. Ben Solo is abrasive and rude, and one of the most consistently ruthless people she’s ever met in her life.

To say nothing of the living hell he’s made her life the past three weeks as they’ve worked on opposite sides of this case.

And yet….

“Yes,” she says immediately, very quickly, before she can talk herself out of it.  He squeezes her hand, and smiles very broadly in response, making her shiver. “I’ll come find you, after.”


	5. I've Never (rated E)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for a five-sentence-fic tumblr prompt: ""I've never--" he groans, unable to finish the thought; she's never felt more victorious."

_“I’ve never–” he groans, unable to finish the thought; Rey’s never felt more victorious._

She smiles at him, feigning ignorance, and circles her hips once, twice, before asking, sweetly: “You’ve never what, Ben?”

He’s too far gone to answer with words. His hands grip her hips, too tight, and he makes a guttural sound deep in his throat that curls her toes. 

“ _Please_ –” he begs brokenly beneath her; though by this point it’s not really clear what he’s begging for. For her to stop? Or to keep going? In the end, she places her hands on his chest for balance, and then speeds up, fucking him so hard and so fast she’ll have bruises later.

Rey has known power before. She’s known control. But the sound of her name on this man’s lips, when she makes him fall apart, will haunt her dreams.


	6. Are you jealous? (E)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written one hundred years ago for a tumblr prompt: "Are you jealous?"

“… _Oh_.”

Rey’s eyes pop open at the sound of Kylo’s strained voice, coming from just to the right of her bed.

She hastily slides her hand out from where it had just been – between her legs; inside her thin cotton underwear; inside  _her_  – and tries to get her breathing back under control.

“Ben,” she says. She wants to sound angry with him, because she  _is_  angry with him.  She is  _definitely_ angry with him, in fact, and not at all secretly pleased that he showed up here, now, of all possible times.

But she knows she doesn’t sound angry at all. She is breathing fast and hard, still coming down from the fantasy that was playing out behind her closed eyelids when Kylo Ren showed up here in person – and instead of saying his name forcefully like she’d intended it leaves her lips on a breathy sigh.

She collects herself and tries to look composed. It’s difficult. “Why… why are you here?” she stammers. And, more to the point: “How long have you been just… standing there, staring at me?”

He doesn’t respond right away. His eyes are wide, unfocused. He looks terrified, as he scrutinizes her face. He takes in her rumpled bedsheets, her flushed appearance.

He swallows thickly and Rey watches as his Adam’s apple bobs, once, in his throat.

“You know why I’m here,” he says tersely, his words clipped and precise. “I have no more control over when this happens than you do. And I just got here. Just long enough ago to know that you… that you were just –“

He can’t finish the sentence. He looks away, unable to hide his deepening blush.

Rey’s stomach flips uncomfortably.

She swallows. “Ben –“ she begins, and then trails off.

Because she has no idea what to say to him. What the hell is she  _supposed_  to say to him? That she’d just been touching herself while thinking of him?

Before she can decide on the right words he makes a pained, strangled noise in the back of his throat, and he’s gone.

Rey sighs, and scrubs a hand over her face.

She hopes he hadn’t been able to read her thoughts just now.

 

* * *

 

Rey is not exactly a stranger to physical pleasure.

The nights on Jakku were lonely, and very long. On nights she couldn’t sleep, her slender fingers would sometimes find their way beneath her clothes, and she would touch herself until stars burst behind her eyelids and her body relaxed enough for sleep to find her.

Sometimes – not often; only once in a while – when the loneliness, or her hunger, or both, got the better of both her and her good judgment, she would spend the night with a certain neighbor of hers, another scavenger, his skin blasted by a lifetime in the sun and the wind and with large, calloused hands. He wasn’t much to look at, and most of the time she couldn’t be bothered to stay with him the whole night. But he filled a need. Helped scratch an itch that, on occasion, she couldn’t reach by herself.

None of these fumbling prior experiences, however, prepared Rey for what it would be like to want Ben.

She tells herself she shouldn’t want him, of course. Every night she berates herself as she lies in her narrow bed, waiting for sleep.

But it’s no use. The hatred she feels for him is so visceral, so intense, that it’s somehow transformed into something else altogether. When she touches herself now, it’s always his thick fingers he imagines instead of her own much slender ones. His mouth on her breast. His long, hard length inside her wet heat.

Does he think about her like that, too?

He couldn’t possibly.

Only sometimes… Rey wonders.

 

* * *

 

Kylo appears by her bed again the next night, his face more flushed than she’s ever seen it, his hands stuffed deep in the pockets of his trousers.

“Great,” he mutters to himself. He scrubs a hand over his face in agitation. “Just what I needed.”

And then, a moment later she hears:  _I want to know how you… do that._ The words are so quiet Rey knows she’s hearing it through their bond rather than aloud. 

He doesn’t clarify what he’s referring to. But he doesn’t have to.

Her heart starts beating a rapid staccato in her chest at his wild confession – but then she wonders, a moment later, if maybe he doesn’t realize she heard him. Maybe he still doesn’t understand how closely their innermost thoughts are connected now that this strange new bond they share has sprung to life.

But then, a moment later, she hears:  _No. I know you heard me. And… I’d give anything to know how to please you._

He slams his eyes shut and clenches his hands into tight fists at his sides. He looks like he’s in agony.

And then he levels her with a look of pure hatred. He says, aloud: “It’s all I’ve been able to think about for weeks.” 

_I hate that you get to touch yourself whenever you want – and I don’t.”_

Rey’s eyes go wide.

Is this… is he admitting to some strange, bizarre kind of jealousy?  

Rey takes a deep breath and closes her eyes as one of the maddest plans she’s ever come up with begins to take shape in her mind.

“Ben –“ she begins.

He opens his eyes.

“Come here,” she says.

A beat.  “Why?”

Rey takes another deep breath. Steadies her nerves.

What the hell is she about to do?

This is a  _terrible_  idea.

But before she can talk herself out of it she says, “I’ll… show you,” very quiet.

She reaches out a hand towards him.

His eyes go wide.


	7. Could you ever love me?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A teeny ficlet written for the following tumblr prompt: "Could you ever love me?"

_“Could you ever love me?”_

Ben looks from Rey, to their new puppy, and then back to Rey again, eyes narrowing.

“That was  _so_  not the dog talking, Rey,” he says; “I saw your lips move.”

Rey laughs at him and ruffles his messy hair, but Ben just pretends to be annoyed with the whole situation and scowls at her.

“Well, it’s what Chewie  _would_  say to you if he could talk, I think,” Rey says, giving their puppy – all ears and legs and wagging tail – a snack from a box of treats. The shelter said he’s only twelve weeks old, and he accepts the snack from Rey with so much enthusiasm he nearly falls off his chair.

“I don’t see why we needed a dog,” Ben says, sourly, arms folded tightly across his chest as he watches Chewie make quick work of his treat. “Dogs are gross, they get hair everywhere…”

But Rey can see how much Ben’s face lights up when Chewie climbs up on his legs a few minutes later, begging for more, and she’s not fooled by Ben’s act one bit.


	8. At a Wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written a billion years ago for a tumblr prompt: "Two miserable people at a wedding."

“No,” Rey says flatly. “Absolutely not.”

But Poe only shakes his head and sighs, exasperated.

“You have to,” he says. He flashes her a cheeky grin. She wants to punch it off his face. “It’s tradition.”

Rey rolls her eyes. “Screw tradition,” she scoffs. “Just because I caught the stupid bridal bouquet does _not_  mean I have to dance with the idiot who caught the garter.”

But she knows Poe’s right.  From the minute they announced their engagement, Rose and Finn made it clear they wanted everything to be as traditional as possible. And none of the rest of them have it in them to deny Rose and Finn anything they wants.

“You know it'd mean a lot to them,” Poe points out, not unkindly. “At least go say hi to the guy who caught the thing?”

Rey sighs. She closes her eyes. “Fine,” she says. “I’ll do it.”

It’s not like this stupid evening could get any worse.

 

* * *

 

The guy who caught the garter--Ben Solo; one of Finn’s childhood friends--looks at least as horrified to be in this situation as she is.

He’s sitting alone at a table near the back of the room, wearing a black suit that fits him like a glove and the most terrified expression Rey has ever seen.

When he looks up from the little scrap of lace he’s clutching in his hands like a live grenade, and sees her walking towards him, bouquet in hand, he looks like he might actually vomit.

“I’m Rey,” she says. She sits down in the chair next to him without waiting for an invitation. “We met a few months ago at the couple’s shower.”

Ben swallows audibly. “I’m… Ben. Ben Solo.” He looks down at his feet. “I remember you.”

They sit next to each other in silence for a very long moment, the awkwardness stretching out between them like an ocean. 

Eventually, Ben clears his throat.  “I think we’re supposed to… um.” He trails off and jerks his head towards the dance floor, where Finn and Rose are leading everyone in a very enthusiastic Macarena.

And then he looks pointedly down at his feet again, his face slowly going the color of a ripe tomato.

Rey feels a sudden rush of sympathy for the only person at this wedding who might actually be more miserable than she is.

On impulse, as a way to lighten the mood, she leans in close and whispers in his ear: “For what it’s worth, Ben Solo – I don’t bite.”

He pulls back and looks at her in alarm. But when he sees she’s smiling--simply teasing him--his face relaxes a little and he cracks a small, hesitant smile.

“That’s… good to know,” he says. “I.. um.  I don’t really know how to dance.”

“Neither do I." Rey stands up and grabs his hand. It’s a very large hand and surprisingly warm. She laces her fingers through his, and doesn’t miss the little tremor that goes through him when she does. “But I don’t think these idiots do, either.”

Ben laughs at that. It’s a deep laugh that suits him, somehow, the smile transforming and lighting up his entire face.  “That’s a good point,” he says. 

And he lets her lead him onto the dance floor.

 

* * *

 

Much later – when they’re back at his table, drinking rum and cokes and ignoring the rest of the people at this party – Ben almost tells her the truth.

That he’s had a ridiculous crush on her for months now, ever since he met her at that shower. That she is, without question, the most beautiful woman in the room.  _Any_ room.

And that he’d been trying to work up the nerve to come talk to her all night before he caught that stupid garter and all hell broke loose.

But his courage does not stretch that far. So he says nothing.

“Do you have a phone number, Ben Solo?” She’s smiling at him now, the alcohol she’s had tonight painted as a beautiful rosy flush on her cheeks. Ben thinks he could easily, happily spend the next year of his life just sitting here, watching her smile.

Smiling does not come naturally to him. His job is a drudgery, and there’s very little in his personal life to smile about either. But somehow, here, with Rey, smiling is effortless.

“As it happens, I do,” he says, smiling back. 

And he gives it to her.


	9. Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Exactly 100 words. Written for the February RFFA Drabble prompt: “heart” (tw: babies)

Ten tiny fingers. Ten little toes.

  
A bundle of warmth, and sweet little noises that stop his heart.

  
Ben was convinced he couldn’t do this. That he would fail at fatherhood as he’s failed at so many of the things that matter.

  
But they’ve worked an incredible sort of magic on him--their little girl; her mother--grinding his darkest fears into dust. He looks down at her; she looks back at him with eyes that are his and a bright smile that is all Rey.

  
His heart twists in his chest, feels too large for his body, as he smiles back.


	10. soap bubbles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> crossingwinter prompted me the following on curiouscat: "reylo, arguing over which dish soap to buy at the grocery store"

“What are you doing?” Ben rests his chin on Rey’s shoulder as he scowls at the phone in her hand. “You don’t honestly mean to buy that, do you?”   
  
Rey turns her head to the side and presses a distracted kiss to his cheek. “Buy what?”   
  
She kisses his cheek again, and he hums contendedly. But he will not be deterred. “That.” He taps at the image of the family-sized jug of store-brand dish soap she just pulled up on the grocery store app. “What is that stuff, anyway?”   
  
Rey rolls her eyes and goes back to scrolling. “Dish soap.”   
  
“I know it’s dish soap,” he says. “Or at least, that it purports to be dish soap.”   
  
Rey taps her phone and begins downloading store coupons. Spending $4.99 for someone to bring their groceries to their car is a luxury worth paying for right now, what with how busy they’ve both been the past few weeks--and given how little they want to be leaving this apartment the next few weeks.   
  
“Ben,” Rey begins in her best let’s be reasonable tone of voice. “We just unpacked all those lovely dishes your mother got as a wedding gift. You like to cook.” She turns her head to the side again; this time, she allows her lips to linger on his cheek. He closes his eyes and sighs, wrapping his arms around her from behind. “So, you know. I figured we should probably get dish soap. So we’re not eating on dirty plates all the time.”   
  
“But that stuff is gross.” He takes the phone from her hands and places it gently on their new dining room table (another gift from Leia). He coaxes her out of the chair she’d been sitting in and turns her so she has to face him. He leans his forehead against hers and, God, she loves it so much when he does this. Loves it when they breathe the same air like this. “If you don’t buy the good stuff all you’re buying is a bottle full of toxins, carcinogens….”   
  
A that, Rey rolls her eyes at him and flicks his ear playfully. He pretends to look stunned and claps his hand over his ear, wincing theatrically.   
  
“Ow,” he says, pouting.   
  
“You’re such a snob,” she tells him for what might be the thousandth time. She winds her arms around his neck and tugs him down until his lips are level with hers. “But you’re my snob.”   
  
“I am,” he confirms, before all thoughts of a grocery store run are forgotten.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr at [jeenonamit](https://jeenonamit.tumblr.com/) and on twitter at [jeenonamit](https://twitter.com/jeenonamit/) as well. Come say hi!


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